Something from an FAA Safety Seminar

[cliffy]

Here in Arizona the top 2 causes of airplane accidents are?

 

1) Mid-airs, yup mid-airs

 

2) Maintenance, preponderance of "owner maintenance issues," not certified shops!

[Mark89114]

I don't believe it, the average is about 30 mid years in the entire U.S and Arizona represents maybe 2% of the US (100%/50, I know a gross simplification) so that would be about 1 mid air per year in AZ and I am sure there are more accidents than that. 

 

I also doubt the second "statistic" as well.  Since most accidents 80-90% are pilot error and most pilots don't really do a lot

of serious work on their airplane I don't believe it.

 

Someone has an agenda on something or the numbers were misheard.

[Andy95W]

Sorry, Cliffy, I agree with Mark. The statistics seem kind of... hinky.

Was this at a FAAST team meeting, or some other safety seminar?

[MB65E]

Makes small sense, but still hard to believe. However, There are more flying days, retired people, and training academies than anywhere else in the country. The airspace is kinda silly down in PHX too. All contributing factors.

-Matt

[Hank]

There were 2 recent midairs in AZ, each with multiple fatalities. That will skew the statistics if that's all you look at. Owner maintenance issues probably includes Experimentals, too.

I thought nationwide there were more like 3-5 midairs annually, not 30. So 2 in one state is an anomaly, spotted by glossing the summary and not digging into it.

[kerry]

I do hear of a lot of mid airs in AZ

[cliffy]

Directly from an FAA FAAST team meeting  He did comment that not all the mid-airs were fatals and he was from the PHX area.

Not all mid-airs result in crashes with fatalities. I know of one where a 180 main wheel bounced off the wing of a Bonanza and both landed safely. A good friend of mine was involved in it. 

He commented specifically on owner induced accidents due to owner (not A&P) maintenance. 

And he specifically said it pertained to AZ only. 

[N201MKTurbo]

While the mid airs are interesting, I would be more interested in the specifics of the owner maintenance problems.

 

As an amateur A&P, I would like to know what they did wrong so I could avoid the same mistakes.

[aviatoreb]

We all know to take statistics with a grain of salt for this very reason.  No offense, Erik!

 

 

 

Its ok - I take statistics with pepper.

[Andy95W]

Directly from an FAA FAAST team meeting  He did comment that not all the mid-airs were fatals and he was from the PHX area.

Not all mid-airs result in crashes with fatalities. I know of one where a 180 main wheel bounced off the wing of a Bonanza and both landed safely. A good friend of mine was involved in it. 

He commented specifically on owner induced accidents due to owner (not A&P) maintenance. 

And he specifically said it pertained to AZ only.

Thanks for the clarification. Whoever would've thunk it?